Matching closest to current date

[luminous]

Hi,

 

I have a single table which contains  a value of 'startdate' how do I return a value which the startdate is closest to the current date past or future?

 

I've tried:

 

SELECT * FROM exhibitions  WHERE (UNIX_TIMESTAMP('CURDATE')=UNIX_TIMESTAMP(exhibitions.startdate))

 

But this seems to return all fields with the same year. 

 

The type in the table for startdate is 'date'

 

Thanks!

[kickstart]

Hi

 

Maybe

 

SELECT *, ABS(DATEDIFF(NOW(),exhibitions.startdate)) AS daysDifference
FROM exhibitions
ORDER BY daysDifference
LIMIT 1

 

All the best

 

Keith

[luminous]

Hey Keith,

 

That seems to of done it! Just wondering quickly would it be easy to implement so it only matches the nearest too current event with multiple dates in the future?

[luminous]

Nevermind

SELECT * , ABS( DATEDIFF( NOW( ) , exhibitions.startdate ) ) AS daysDifference
FROM exhibitions
WHERE exhibitions.startdate > NOW( ) 
ORDER BY daysDifference
LIMIT 1

 

seems to have done the jobs.

 

Thanks for the help!